Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Seasonal Post-Mortem Spectacular: Part 3

Spoilers for the following: The Blacklist, and fucking Hannibal.

The Blacklist:

Okay, so, I just don't know how I feel about this show right now. I was pretty disappointed in the finale. The season has had bigger, more interesting story arcs. I felt like the episode that started the season 1 hiatus was much better and had a more interesting plot line than the actual finale. The Blacklist also has a habit of killing off prominent female characters while only injuring the prominent male characters. (Here's a good link outlining that a little bit better.) One of the things I originally liked was that the show wasn't super white and male (I mean, it was, but not for tv), but that has been slowly whittled down over the length of season 1. I dunno, I'm going to end up watching Season 2 because my roommate is and I'm still vaguely interested, but I'm not really pumped for it. My feelings are a solid 'meh'.

Hannibal:

Okay, lemme just get this out of the way: HOLY FUCKBALLS

*ahem*

This season of Hannibal has had some rough moments. I'm still upset over what happened to Beverly, I'm still unhappy that Fuller had Margot have sex with Will. I understand his reasons, I really do, but even with that context, I wish he hadn't gone about it the way that he had. I would say that the season had 'growing pains', and hopefully it's something that Fuller learned from and will endeavor to do better with, in the future. Since Fuller has been good about listening to fans and their reactions in the past, I feel confident about that.

That being said, the build up to reveal Abigail was amazing. I was, honestly, not surprised that she was still alive. They foreshadowed that with revealing that A: Miriam Lass was still alive, and B: by all the talk of fatherhood leading up to the final episode. One of the reasons that Hannibal tipped Mason Verger off to Margot's pregnancy was because of Abigail. He spoke of the teacup shattering, coming back together, and not only did we see the teacup come back together during that airing, but then Margot's pregnancy was terminated- Hannibal was literally making room in the world/Will's life for Abigail.

Also, I know people are mad that Abigail shoved Alana out of the window (I didn't realize it was her, at first, I thought Hannibal had done it, I had to review the footage) but it's possible she did it to keep Hannibal from doing something worse. I mean, if she shoves Dr. Bloom out of the window she might die, but her apparent injuries (at the end of the episode) are possibly the least serious. And it's better than watching Hannibal kill Dr. Bloom with his bare fucking hands.

In all honesty, I expected the season to end on this kind of note. I mean, at some point, Hannibal was going to gut Will Graham and flee, and Fuller seems to live by 'go big or go home', so this was a real emotional gutpunch of a finale. Though it ends with everything being awful (and betrayal from our queen Bedelia, how could you?) it's still a satisfying end to the Season 2 arc, and I look forward to season 3.

Though I will remind you guys to not believe anything Bryan Fuller says about who lives or dies next season because we all know that he fucking lies. He lied about Abigail being for real dead. He will lie about who will live going into next season. Do not trust the man.

Things of note about Season 2:

Early in the season, Dr. Bloom transforms into a flowing, liquid blackness. In the last episode, she is (symbolically) drowned in very similar black liquid. I don't know what it means, but man it looks cool. (Well, in the last episode it's symbolic of the taint she feels, but I don't know exactly how it's related to the earlier symbolism.)

Red Fred: Part of the reason the show ends the way it ends is that Hannibal smells Freddie Lounds on Will, and (therefore) knows that she is alive. In his mind, she appears with a red face- clay red. It could be a number of things, of course, the red could be related to her hair, or the scent she was wearing that triggered Hannibal's memory response, but my roommate Lirenth suggested that it might be in reference to a Roman Triumph, because the red face paint reminds her of that. As soon as I badger her into writing a blog post about it, I'll link it here.